In January 2008, Unity08 organizers announced that the group had suspended operations due to funding problems.[3]Americans Elect 2012 is an organization that was formed by many of the individuals that were responsible for Unity 08, and had substantially identical goals for the 2012 presidential election cycle. Americans Elect also failed to nominate a candidate.

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The political reform movement was founded as a non-profit organization by several political figures: Democrats Hamilton Jordan and Gerald Rafshoon, Republican Doug Bailey and the former two-term independentMaineGovernorAngus King.[1] Unity08 is attempting to leverage online technology, such as secure voting, to allow American voters to determine the most crucial issues facing the country, discuss them with potential nominees, and participate in an online convention to nominate a bipartisan presidential ticket. In an interview that aired on The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer in May 2006, Unity08's founders said that the group was formed in response to the polarization between the Republican and Democratic political parties. The group also cited a poll it commissioned from Princeton Survey Research and claimed that 82 percent of Americans think that the two major political parties are unable to address the country's problems and that 73 percent of Americans are in favor of alternatives to the two parties.[4]

The group's status as a non-profit organization came into question when they asked the Federal Election Commission whether the group could defer registering as a political action committee until after its candidates for the 2008 presidential election are named. A draft released by the commission in July 2006 concluded that "Unity08 must register as a policy committee and therefore is subject to the reporting requirements and limitations and prohibitions."[5] In October 2006, the commission voted on the matter and declared that the group must register as a political action committee.

In January 2008, Bailey and Rafshoon announced that they were leaving the organization and were planning to launch a national effort to draftNew York CityMayorMichael Bloomberg to run for president.[8] Shortly thereafter, representatives for Unity08 announced that the organization was scaling back operations and suspending activities, citing lack of adequate funding and disputes with the Federal Election Commission.[9] Unity08 was unable to resume operations prior to the 2008 presidential election.

The Unity08 presidential ticket was to consist of two candidates that come from different political parties. This bipartisan team was to propose a bipartisan cabinet in an effort to end paralysis in government. Co-founder Doug Bailey explained "What we are trying to do is to create a forum for people who are in the middle who have been left out of politics."[1]

Neither Bloomberg nor Hagel chose to run for president. Former SenatorSam Nunn of Georgia, a one-time prospective Unity08 nominee,[13] also chose not to run and instead endorsed Democratic candidate Barack Obama.[14]

Campaign watchdog groups such as The Campaign Legal Center and Democracy 21 criticized the group's initial classification as a non-profit organization, "because Unity08 makes clear that its principal purpose is to influence the 2008 presidential election".[5]